The Palais Royale Ballroom: Where They Danced for Joy

A couple weeks ago I received an email from Cherie Cheney Nomura who mentioned that her father, Ed Cheney, once owned a ballroom on Burnside in Portland in the 1940s.

Would I be interested in a few photos from the ballroom she inquired? “Absolutely,”  was my answer.

She took the time to dig out photos, newspaper clippings and other memorabilia and made copies of everything for me. Even better, she composed a document about her father’s ballroom that I am re-printing [pretty much verbatim] and am using as the kick-off for my oral history project.

Thanks Cherie – hopefully the memories of your father’s ballroom will inspire others to share their own stories about the place and about Portland and Oregon.

Once located at 2115 West Burnside, the ballroom had many different names before my father bought it in 1944, including DeHoney’s Ballroom, the Uptown Ballroom and finally the Palais after he purchased it.

The ballroom was open six nights each night with a designated dance. Some of the types and styles included Old Timers which meant old structured dances such as Schottische, Varsovienne, Viennese Waltz, Polka, the Quick Step, and the Peabody.

These were full houses of accomplished dancers who knew the intricate steps and patterns of these dances. Another designation was “modern,” which meant jitterbug, foxtrot, Balboa, swing, glides and waltzes.

Latin was also popular and included rhumba, Bolero, tango, samba, merengue, salsa, cha cha cha, Paso Doble, Mambo and Bossa Nova.

Dancers included older and younger adults, married couples, singles, high school and college students, service men and women. Many couples would arrive separately and meet up to dance – it was usual for men and women to arrive alone.

The building
The ballroom was almost half of a block size with three floors. The street level housed a Chinese restaurant, a cleaners, a variety store and a books store. To enter the ballroom, dancers walked up a long ramp from the street level up to the second floor. At the entry to the ballroom was the cashier’s booth and inside the large double doors was the coat check room, the office. cafeteria, the ladies “lounge,” and men’s room.

Stairs led to the third story which was entirely a ballroom floor of very fine hardwood. There was a bandstand for the house band at one end and alcoves on each side of the bandstand.

On each side of the bandstand was a reader board that announced the next dance.

One alcove side was for the single women and the other side for single men. Couples could sit on the leather benches that were around the edges of the ballroom. Some dances were called “Men’s choice,” and the men would go to the ladies’ alcove and select a partner and vice versa.

View Larger Map

[Scooch around the map a bit - I believe the old site is now the parking lot of the Subway franchise.]

No booze, no cars and lots of fashion
No alcohol was served at the ballroom. Hungry dancers could eat sandwiches, dessert and drink coffee at the cafeteria or enjoy a soda at the soda fountain. People would also occasionally step out to their cars for a quick shot of alcohol though a cop guarded the entrance door to ensure no one showed up inebriated.

Many dancers [and Portlanders in general] only had one car or no car. Many of the dancers arrived by bus are taxi. There was a taxi stand out front and uniformed taxi drivers would line up to take home the dancers at the end of the evening.

Coats and ties were expected for men – with a supply of coats and ties available in the coat room for those who didn’t have them. Service men and women could wear their uniforms – and being the WWII era – there were lots of them.

Young people in high school and college could wear their “clean school clothes” and all women were required to wear skirts – no slacks or jeans.

Famous performers for the dancers at the ballroom included Tex Benneke, Wayne King [The Waltz King]. Other celebrities that performed at the ballroom but not for the dancers included Stan Kenton, Red Buttons, Billy Eckstein, The Mills Brothers, and Louis Armstrong and his All Stars.

The demise of the ballroom? Rock and/or roll
By the mid-1950s dancing styles and lifestyles went through some huge changes. TV became available and people started to stay home. The large dance floors were not necessary for the new dance styles such as the Twist where partners weren’t generally needed for the “free form” dancing. The public for the most part lost interest in more traditional ballroom dances in favor of inhibited, unpartnered, unstructured, extemporaneous “dancing.”

Fortunately for my father, he sold the ballroom just before the demise of grand ballrooms. The new owners allowed alcohol and smoking, no dress code was required and the formal dance band was replaced with very loud electronic music and youthful “rock” bands took over. The building was eventually closed and then demolished because it was a nuisance, dangerous and was so poorly maintained.

Sidenote: Cherie also handed over a 1945 issue of The Oregonian that highlighted her dad’s ballroom. Below is a scan from the article about young couples doing the Portland Walk, described by the writer:

“The Portland Walk is the favorite with the younger disciples of Terpsichore these days. Garbed in Levis, rolled high, the young men steer their companions around the floor, apparently oblivious to others in the spacious ballroom. The young lady’s back is bent backward in a manner that seems to threaten the spine, but the walk apparently is popular. The Levi and bobby-sock brigade also get hep on the jitterbug numbers.”

Also, a Google search came up with this article about a riot in 1960 at the ballroom when Ray Charles didn’t show up to a scheduled show.

The Lost Oregon Oral History Project

This has been brewing for quite some time.

Sure, I love our architecture, buildings, streetscapes, wacky hotels and roadside oddities that all make Oregon a wonderful place we call home.

But, something strange happened along the way.

People started commenting [as I would hope, this being a blog, ya know?] about their experiences with the buildings or the postcards I was scanning and posting.

Here are some comments from the many that I wanted to use to illustrate the illuminating [and to them maybe even mundane but to me, fascinating memories]:

• I have two souvenirs from the Oregon Centennial. A cup and saucer printed with the official logo and scenes. But I also  have a printout from our first “computer” experience. Pacific Power and Light Company had a  Burroughs 205 “Computer” set up. If you typed in your name and the year you were born, it  printed out the events going on in Oregon that year.
• My father was the structural engineer who designed the Civil Defense Operations Center at Kelly Butte. Before it opened he took us to see it. I remember seeing the Diesel generators, the vaulted control room with the big map on the wall, the bunk rooms, the kitchen, the decontamination area. To a little kid, nuclear war looked like an exciting adventure.
• The Music and Art Fair ( 1971?) at the stadium featured a ton of great rock bands, but no money to pay them. Highlight was Bo Diddley punching out the promoter, then Bo’s girlfriend punching out the promoters wife.
• The Carriage Room Burlesque ( strip) joint on Broadway, that up through the 70’s still featured a comic with every performance. Roberts Rod & Reel downtown, Mort Sahl, Sammy Davis, Jr. and many others played there.
• Frank Zappa told me once backstage at the Paramount that Portland was the weirdest place on earth. I think Frank may have been right! In a good way.
• My mother worked as the hostess at Amato’s around 1957-1961. I was only at Amato’s once, as I recall. Had an Elvis Presley (green colored drink for kids) and my sisters had a (pink) Shirley Temple. My mother used to bring home photos of the people who performed at Amato’s (Sammy Davis Jr., likely the only non-white person in the club, among them). She met my stepfather at Amatos. He managed the Owens-Illinois glass plant out near the airport (still there) and took us to dinner at the Aero Club from time to time. Finger bowls were a new one for me.

Their memories were filling in the gaps for me – from earlier decades I was too young to remember to later decades I was not living in Oregon yet. It made the history snap alive. And I thought, if they weren’t commenting on my blog, we’re their memories and recollections lost for all time?

Oregon is well documented up to about WWII. We’re set with the Oregon Trail, the depression and Lewis and Clark information. After that it becomes a bit fuzzy. Sure, OHS has their well-researched  journal and exhibits and there are educated and professional historians doing lots of leg work. But it’s all way too big-picture for me. I want to hear the daily experiences from Oregonians. I’m keen on the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s [especially the Nixon years and then 1977 - the punk years]. Call it guerilla history. Or storytelling.

There are a couple of ways I want to approach this. I invite you to share with me via email your memories in the comment sections or by emailing me.

I also have a tape recorder, video recorder and plan on interviewing and posting audio and video files and transcripts from my interviews, of which I have a couple in the works [one with a gentleman born in Portland in 1931]. Whether this stays as Lost Oregon or morphs into a different blog remains to be seen.

Thanks Oregon!

The Dill Pickle Club

I’m surprised I haven’t run into the Portland-based Dill Pickle Club group yet, but better late than never. I met with one the founders, Marc Moscato, last week and we chatted about local history, WPA projects, hobos and Chicago in the 1930s.

The club’s namesake originates from Jazz-Age Chicago’s legendary yet ill-forgotten speakeasy, founded in 1914 by labor organizer Jack Jones, Jim Larkin and Ben “Clap Doctor” Reitman. The Pickle was the heart of the “Chicago Renaissance” and the meeting spot for the city’s most noted authors, musicians and activists, including Sherwood Anderson, Ben Hecht, Mary MacLane, Lucy Parsons, Kenneth Rexroth and Carl Sandburg. It closed its doors in 1934.

According to their web site, the club will host a monthly presentation series in “which academics, zinesters, political activists, artists and people of every political shade under the sun can come together to examine life as we know it. Presentations will be controversial, offbeat and intellectual, and provide an experimental format to critique contemporary politics, culture and humanities.”

Marc’s an interesting guy and has done some fantastic work, including the film The More Things Stay The Same that examines the life and world of Dr. Ben Reitman (1879-1942), known in his day as “the Clap Doctor,”  “King of the Hoboes” and “the most vulgar man in America.”

As part of their Field Trip series, they have planned is a bike ride next Sunday, June 28, that will explore Portland area WPA projects. Unfortunately the ride sold out quickly so they might add another ride the following week if there’s enough interest. Send an email to yes@dillpickleclub.com if interested.

I’m looking forward to more great work from this group- they’re a wonderful addition to the Portland landscape.

Welcome Oregonian readers

Thanks for stopping by after reading the piece by Peter Carlin. Poke around, check things out and please comment – I’d love to hear your memories.

Thanks!

Halfway, Ore., renaming and branding

Mayor: Hey, the photographer for the postcard company is going to be here tomorrow to take some shots of our town.

City manager: Well, let’s spruce it up a bit – we can get some paint from Johnson’s old farmhouse – make ‘er look nice.

Councilperson: Um, the photographer came yesterday.

Postcard photographers were like Google Street View cars nowadays- ya never know when they’re gonna swoop in and start snapping.

And Halfway? Remember them from the late 1990s? They sold the naming rights to their town to Half.com, Ore.

Here’s a great update by Design Observer from a couple years back that gives the lowdown on the hows and whys of renaming your town – and going so far as to let a company buy your rights or choosing other  ill-fated names.

Here’s a graf from the article:

Other towns have reconfigured their identities by renaming their towns themselves. Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania renamed itself Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania in 1954, when the widow of the sports star agreed to bury him there. in 1950, the town of Hot Springs, New Mexico, renamed itself Truth or Consequences — after the game show by the same name. More recently, Ismay, Montana changed its name to Joe, Montana — hoping to build profitably upon the name of the football superstar by the same name.

Don’t get me started on city taglines, either. I’m not the biggest fan of taglines in general ["committed to exceptional service," "price, value, service."] Ugh. If you’re going to write a tagline, make it relevant to the brand at least. Or make it memorable.

Regardless, here are the Tagline Guru’s  The Top 50 U.S. City Slogans.

Oh, and Halfway? Nowadays it looks like a friendly, well-kept Oregon small town. The town took the Half.com money and used it to renovate their town. Kudos, Halfway!

So long, McCormick and Schmick’s

McCormick and Schmick's, circa 1979

As you’ve probably already heard or read, McCormick & Schmick’s original location on SW First has shut its doors.

Citing the economy and the inability to negotiate a new lease with the landlord the venerable restaurant closed on Wednesday for good. I hate to see this happen, regardless if the quality had gone down somewhat.

The First Portland Catalogue, published in 1979, had this to say about the restaurant:

McCormick and Schmick’s is a wonderful new addition to the Portland restaurant community…and is decorated simply with hardwood floors, high ceilings and a long bar.

Have no fear though – Portland still has many steakhouses to choose from, and in fact, will be the focus over at Portland Food and Drink as Food Dude samples some of the better ones around Portland.

According to the site, Food Dude will visit four steakhouses in four weeks and compare Morton’s, Ringside, Ruth’s Chris, and El Gaucho.

Of the four, I’ve only been to the Ringside on Burnside and enjoyed it immensely with it dim lights, Frank and Dino on the hi-fi and great steaks.

Personally, I’m still waiting for the upscale steakhouse food cart. To make it interesting – no utensils – just a nice big slab of meat half-wrapped in butcher paper ready to eat. Grass-fed and local, of course.

The Scribe – Portland’s 70s Underground Newspaper

Every once in a while I come across an image, factoid, booklet or yeah, postcard, that reminds me why I produce Lost Oregon [other than the gazillions of adoring fans or occasional crackpot emailer]. Last week I nabbed a stack of old issues of the Portland Scribe, Portland’s own early 1970s underground/counterculture newspaper from 1972 – 1975.

The late 60s and early 70s were ripe for newspapers such as the Scribe – most of the daily biggies didn’t cover much of the news that these smaller circulation papers carried – the Vietnam war, impeaching Nixon, music and underground film, labor issues, the draft, and most importantly, local issues.

Sure, some of the content is unintentionally funny [“The EYES, an all-woman, all-rock from Oakland, California, played in Portland at Beaver Hall”] or hilariously dated [“EYES zapped right into what is considered by some to be within the capabilities of men only; they even did a ‘macho medley-for all closet Rolling Stones fans,’ a total triumph over male chauvinist pigs and m.c.p. dupes.”].

There are Wounded Knee references galore. Obscenity is used freely. There’s a review of Deep Throat – it screened at the Aladdin Theater – the reviewer didn’t care for it. Laurelhurst Park had jazz concerts in 1975 that were eventually shut down by the city. Jerry Lee Lewis played Crystal Palace in 1972. There are all kinds of minute pieces of local history that have slipped through the cracks. It’s a real-time glimpse into our city that I’ve never seen.

The paper holds up well. The layout and design got increasingly sophisticated each year. Each issue has a classified section that offers help to homeless teens, draft dodgers and cheap housing for hippes. I was also impressed with the DIY aesthetic represented with regards to growing your own food; organic gardening and living healthier.

My take is that The Scribe set the groundwork for what we now know as Portland. Growing your own food and self-reliance? Check. Fighting big business and agribusiness? Check. Protesting ugly buildings being built while razing historical ones? Check. [“High rising with the rich folks,” reported that “an 18-story luxury apartment building is being planned by Harold and Arleen Schnitzer. This building exemplifies all of the short-comings of high-rise construction.”]

My favorite score though is the collection of great advertising and imagery from local businesses including record stores, clubs, head shops, book stores, boutiques, and other shops that were frequented by the hippies, freaks, anti-war folks, and I’m sure, narcs.

I’ll be scanning and posting some of the best of the adverts soon and will be using many of the food-related ads for my in-progress post on the history of Portland dining, 1955-1980.

The masthead:

The Hockshop on Grand:

Summerfest, 1973.  All-day? Portland International Raceway? This has “bad acid” written all over it:

The Yellow Submarine Shop:

Milwaukie High, 1972

Picked up a curious booklet a couple month’s ago – a handbook of sorts for students of Milwaukie High School in Milwaukie, Ore., for the class of 1971-1972.

In it are various rules and regulations, facts, photos, and a calendar of sporting and other events. I’m sure there’s a wiki page now or at least a web site that spells out everything for students.

I was struck by how simpler things were in the early 1970s – almost quaint, at least from the booklet’s copy.

Example? From the “Things that are nice to remember” section:

“Demonstrate good social taste. Refrain from familiarity and petting in the halls and on the grounds.”

Ferchrissakes. Was this written in 1920?

It gets better with the dress regulations. The boys got off easy:

“Hair should be neat and trimmed – the guideline is that the shirt collar and ears must be clearly visible. Bermudas may be worn if they are neat and clean.”

The girls? They get three paragraphs on how to dress with lots of finger wagging.

Here’s the gist:

“Good grooming is basic to an attractive appearance. Culottes and culotted dresses are accepted if sufficiently full to resemble a skirt length. We would like to think of the class room time as a training period for developing an appearance that reflects good judgment. “

And on it goes….basically if you show up dressed inappropriately you’d better have a note from your parents – you SLUT.

Here’s some imagery from the booklet:

“Hi.”  Please see The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks.

Definitely the coolest teacher on campus. The vice principal.

The coaching staff. Wanna be a wise guy with this bunch? Prepared to feel the wrath of the Milwaukie Mafia, pal. They will break you in two.

The Pony Pipers, gleeing it up at intermission.